Business Digest October 12, 2012

Longmont United Hospital opened the Milestone Cardiology Associates in an office at the west end of the hospital at 2030 Mountain View Ave. Cardiologist Murry Drescher is heading the cardiology practice, which is part of Milestone Medical Group. The hospital also has two catheterization laboratories and a three-dimensional cardio echo machine to serve its heart patients.

BRIEFS

Denmark-based Vestas Wind Systems A/S is consolidating its three U.S. research and development operations to Brighton. One of those operations was is in Louisville. In July 2010, Vestas signed a six-year lease for 48,000 square feet of space at 361 Centennial Parkway in Louisville, where it set up its Technology R&D Centre. The company said at the time it would employ about 75 to 100 workers in the first year with an average annual salary of $80,000.

Boulder-based Rally Software Development Corp. is launching an initiative to help community-minded engineers apply their knowledge and skills to social problems. The campaign, called “Rally for Impact,” includes donating free user licenses for Rally project collaboration tools to nonprofit organizations, citizen engineers and students, among others.

Boulder-based Elevations Credit Union joined the Coalition for Credit Union Access, a group of federal and state chartered credit union and state credit union leagues united in favor of allowing credit unions to benefit from supplemental capital.

Homoquotables, a small Boulder company that makes greeting cards for gays and lesbians, has begun distributing cards at a small number of stores on the East Coast and has plans to expand nationally. Dan McLellan founded Homoquotables, which launched in January online and now is selling cards at Boulder Bookstore on the Pearl Street Mall in Boulder.

Longmont-based craft brewer Oskar Blues Brewery is continuing its expansion into new markets, announcing it will now sell beer in Ohio and northern Kentucky. The launch is the third in as many months for Oskar Blues, which recently began selling in the Chicago market and in Alabama. Earlier this year it announced plans to open a new brewery in North Carolina in December. Oskar Blues has formed partnerships with two companies to distribute in the area. Stagnaro Distributing will cover the Cincinnati and northern Kentucky markets, while Superior Beverage Group will distribute in Columbus and Cleveland.

Medical-device maker Covidien Plc received approvals from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and a European regulatory agency for its Nellcor Bedside Respiratory Patient Monitoring System. The product will be marketed and sold by the company’s respiratory and monitoring solutions business unit in Gunbarrel. The machine monitors blood oxygenation, pulse rate and other data to help clinicians respond to patient respiratory events quickly.

Craft beer lovers have named Oskar Blues Homemade Liquids & Solids one of the region’s favorite “beer bars,” according to a survey released by the Boulder-based Brewers Association. Voters in the Great American Beer Bar competition, conducted by CraftBeer.com, rated the Longmont brew pub the second favorite craft beer bar in the Mountain West region. Nearly 30,000 votes were cast and 3,300 bars were nominated for the rankings. In the Mountain West region, Liquids & Solids was ranked between Falling Rock Tap House in Denver, which took first place, and Mayor of Old Town, in Fort Collins, which placed third.

Corgenix Medical Corp. reported record revenue of $9.3 million for the fiscal year, as the company continued to grow. Broomfield-based Corgenix (OTC BB: CONX.OB) said revenue was $9,289,358 for the fiscal year ended June 30, compared with $7,941,576 for the previous year, a 17 percent increase. The company also reported a net loss of $623,391 for the fiscal year, compared with $414,553 for the prior year. Corgenix sells more than 50 medical diagnostic kits for use in clinical labs to test for such health issues as immunology disorders, vascular diseases and bone and joint disorders.

Boulder-based BiOptix Diagnostics Corp. plans to expand into Europe. The research biosensor instrument company launched its European sales and marketing efforts at a trade show in Basel, Switzerland. The company will support an industry meeting in Amsterdam in November, followed by a separate industry symposium in Vienna in November. BiOptix’s new biosensor device — the BiOptix 404pi — uses optical technology that can monitor biological interactions, including molecule interactions of proteins.

The city of Boulder recently completed a 2.5-year modernization project of its historic Boulder Canyon Hydroelectric facility with the help of a $1.18 million American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grant from the U.S. Department of Energy. Built in 1910, the facility was in need of upgrading if it was to continue to be operable. Without a new turbine and generator, operation of the facility was expected to cease within five years or fewer.

CONTRACTS

Boulder-based water-treatment company New Sky Energy LLC has partnered with a water-treatment company 212 Resources Corp. in Houston. to clean industrial and agricultural wastewater. Financial terms of the partnership were not disclosed. New Sky Energy plans to hire 10 to 15 new employees in the next year in Colorado, California and Texas as a result of the partnership. The company currently has seven employees spread among offices in Boulder and in Austin, Texas.

Louisville-based Envysion Inc. has been selected by Chick-fil-A as a video provider. The quick-service chicken restaurant with more than 1,600 locations in the United States will use Envysion to improve operations, training and customer service.

GRANTS

Clinica Campesina Family Health Services in Lafayette has been awarded a $55,000 grant by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services to improve the quality of care and ensure more women are screened for cervical cancer. The grant will help the center become a patient-centered medical home and increase its rate of cervical-cancer screening.

Boulder-based Siva Therapeutics Inc. received a $350,000 grant from San Francisco-based Thiel Foundation through its innovation program Breakout Labs. Siva will use the funds for cancer and rheumatoid-arthritis research. Silva will work on improving gold nanorods that can be inserted into a cancer patient’s body and heated to kill tumors. In addition, Siva will use the funds to develop a portable infrared light in partnership with NanoRods LLC, a nanotechnology company in Germantown, Maryland, that makes and sells the gold nanorods used in Siva’s photothermal-therapy research.

Colorado will receive $329,517 in federal funding to help the state’s small businesses export their goods and services as part of the U.S. Small Business Administration’s State Trade and Export Promotion Grant Program. The program is administered by the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade. The goals of the program are to increase the number of small businesses that want to export and to increase the value of exports for those small businesses that currently export.

The Gold Hill Fire Protection District has received $87,179 in competitive grant funds from the federal Department of Homeland Security’s Assistance to Firefighters Grant program. The funds can be used to help the district acquire equipment, protective gear, training, and other resources to more effectively protect communities from the threat of fire.

Ball Corp., a manufacturer of packaging for beverage, food and household products, has agreed to acquire Envases del Plata S.A. de C.V., an aluminum aerosol packaging producer that has a manufacturing facility in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of October. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. The plant produces aluminum aerosol cans for personal-care and household products to customers in North, Central and South America. It employs approximately 150 people and operates five manufacturing lines. In a separate deal, Broomfield-based Ball (NYSE: BLL) and the Envases del Plata Group have agreed to form a joint venture in Argentina that will combine Ball Corp.’s aerosol packaging operations in Argentina and Envases’ operation in Manaus, Brazil. The new Argentine joint venture, called Envases-Ball, will include Ball’s steel aerosol can plants in Buenos Aires and San Luis, Argentina, and Envases’ extruded aluminum packaging plants in the same locations and in Manaus, Brazil.

PSEG Solar Source acquired a 15-megawatt solar project in Milford, Delaware, from Boulder-based Juwi Solar Inc. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Deadline to submit items for Business Digest is three weeks prior to publication of each biweekly issue. Mail to Editor, Boulder County Business Report, 3180 Sterling Circle, Suite 201, Boulder, CO 80301-2338; fax to 303-440-8954; or email to news@bcbr.com with Business Digest in the subject line. Photos submitted will not be returned.